Svetina Saša
Institute of Biophysics, Faculty of Medicine, University of Ljubljana, Ljubljana, Slovenia.
Jožef Stefan Institute, Ljubljana, Slovenia.
Eur Biophys J. 2017 Dec;46(8):739-748. doi: 10.1007/s00249-017-1258-y. Epub 2017 Oct 6.
Here we discuss cell-to-cell variability in isogenic cell populations on the basis of an analogy between the processes of vesicle self-reproduction and cell self-replication. A short review of the theoretical analysis of vesicle self-reproduction is presented to indicate that this process only occurs under the fulfillment of specific criteria: causal relations between the values of vesicle variables involved in its growth and division, and the parameters of the environment. It is shown that when division is asymmetric, both vesicle birth size and interdivision times are variable. We argue that during cell self-replication, the balance between processes of cell growth and division also relies on causal relations between the corresponding cellular variables. A possible method is suggested to unravel previously unidentified causal relations between cell variables from the relationships between their variability parameters such as the widths of their probability distributions and their correlation coefficients. The method is outlined by reviewing the results of the corresponding analysis applied to a population of red blood cells. Some novel research directions are suggested that could lead from the analysis of cell-to-cell variability to a better understanding of the organizational structure of cells and possibly also their evolutionary origin.
在此，我们基于囊泡自我繁殖与细胞自我复制过程之间的类比，讨论同基因细胞群体中的细胞间变异性。本文对囊泡自我繁殖的理论分析进行了简要回顾，以表明该过程仅在满足特定标准时才会发生：囊泡生长和分裂所涉及的变量值与环境参数之间的因果关系。结果表明，当分裂不对称时，囊泡的初始大小和分裂间隔时间都是可变的。我们认为，在细胞自我复制过程中，细胞生长和分裂过程之间的平衡同样依赖于相应细胞变量之间的因果关系。本文提出了一种可能的方法，可从细胞变量的变异性参数（如概率分布宽度和相关系数）之间的关系中，揭示先前未识别的细胞变量之间的因果关系。通过回顾对红细胞群体进行的相应分析结果，概述了该方法。本文还提出了一些新的研究方向，这些方向可能会从细胞间变异性分析出发，更好地理解细胞的组织结构，甚至可能理解其进化起源。
